BTW, add to this the 9% that eBay and PP tack on (if selling via eBay) and that's an extra 50-60 cents on top of the increase. Doesn't PP also charge for currency conversion? I mean, it's just to the point it will all just price us out of existence.

Sorry, I didn't see the "page 2" of this thread when I answered about the effective date.

Here's our note about the shipping rate increases on the Hypnos store. It's only $1 per order for US & Canada, but the increases for Europe/UK and Japan/Australia/NZ are almost double.... and we were already losing money on shipping to these locals, prior to the increases.

Quote

We haven't changed rates in the last decade, but due to significant rate hikes from US Postal Service, our rates (see below) went up Jan 27, 2013.

We regret imposing these increases on our customers, and realize that some of you, especially those overseas, will by necessity order less often. We can only state again that these higher rates represent only a small part of the rate increases passed along to us by USPS, and in many cases it will cost us double or even triple these amounts to actually send your packages, especially for larger orders.

Here is a breakdown by country/region with regard to the USPS increase. Shipping a 5-OZ CD package to Canada jumps up 238%, to the UK, Asia & Australia jumps up 208%. With the new Hypnos format digipaks, you might be able to get the weight just at or under 4-oz with minimal packaging but that poses the risk of damage and then having to re-ship a replacement. This just sucks-diddly-ucks. USPS should modify the prices somewhat based on content value or something. Someone selling jewelry that weighs 5-oa but is worth $100 is a lot less impacted that someone who is selling an item that costs LESS than the shipping itself.

I can now send 100 grams (3.5 oz) to USA for $2.65 (one dataobsura album in envelope)and up to 250 grams (8.8oz) to USA for $5.53 (four dataobscura albums in envelope)

Same thing for central Europe/Britain is $5.20 and $10.

Our dollars are about on par with each other.And because I use a light weight case the album weighs just less that 2oz. Similar to a digipak weight.

I don't send anything registered. I've never had a package not arrive in 10 years of shipping lots of albums ... all over the world ...except for one when I wrote the address wrong :-)

So, my advice for keeping shipping costs down is to not ship registered and to release only using lighter cases rather than the heavy-clunky old original ones. I use poly cases, which don't break anywhere as easily as the hard plastic ones, so I can use lighter envelopes for shipping.

APK, you've given me another reason to defect to Canada! Postal rates are reasonable!

This page has a shipping calculator based on the old and new rates and indicates slightly less rates than the USPS chart. At 5 ounces it's still 114% higher (or 2.14 times the current rate) to ship to Canada than it was yesterday. Great Britain comes out to $11.48 or an 88% increase. I guess we will just have to see what the real numbers are after actually shipping an item. I know that there is a LOT of confusion over the new prices, not even the USPS employees were clear on incremental increases with respect to weight were only they were referencing the chart I already posted (and is widely accepted as what is going to be). Regardless, it's still right around 2x more expensive.

Whatever the actual cost is ... that is simply what it is. It is what you as a seller have to pay for sending, and for the buyer it is the cost of conveniently having a product delivered to your doorstep (which is kinda nice). Of course the buyer always wishes albums cost less, and that shipping costs were just pennies. But its unrealistic. Albums are, I think, already quite low and reasonable in most cases. Shipping costs are out of our hands. There are very few labels charging any "handling costs". And with the internet, as a buyer you can always look at the cost of shipping from another country to see for yourself what the actual cost is and if there is a cheaper way available.

I wouldn“t be surprised at all if the old shipping prices was a result of subsidies by the state for economical reasons (increasing exports). So very likely those old prices wasn“t balanced in terms of expenses to run this business model in the long term.

Over here (in the UK), the Post Office has also increased it's overseas postage prices too. A single CD and artwork in a jewel case decently packed to the States now costs £3.86 - as small packet / airmail (£3.30 with minimal packing). Taking the jewel case out and using a flat-pack type case it's still £2.89 - not including the price of the postage materials. It's getting to the point where you have to think about significantly hiking up the price of an album to compensate.

So, irregardless of whether people have preferences for a CD / CD-R being the 'real' release (as opposed to a download), financial factors may well contribute more so to the demise of the silver discs and move artists more to the download only release 'model'. I find this discouraging myself, but things change.

Seeing more and more stories of small businesses(not just music sellers) affected by this price hike. This will have a chilling effect on all mail-order; Those customers deciding not to buy an item because of the necessarily higher shipping costs and those sellers who will either eat the losses or just decide not to ship overseas anymore. Bad for business all around.

For artists and music sellers, it seems like this increases the pressure to move to pure digital downloads, driving one more nail into the coffin for physical CDs. The Law of Unintended Consequences in action again.

Seeing more and more stories of small businesses(not just music sellers) affected by this price hike. This will have a chilling effect on all mail-order; Those customers deciding not to buy an item because of the necessarily higher shipping costs and those sellers who will either eat the losses or just decide not to ship overseas anymore. Bad for business all around.

For artists and music sellers, it seems like this increases the pressure to move to pure digital downloads, driving one more nail into the coffin for physical CDs. The Law of Unintended Consequences in action again.

I am as well reading about this. Video games, vinyl, other small things that people made a living selling but maybe aren't worth a lot. For what it's worth, I had several things I needed to mail yesterday and one was a CD which I was sending domestically but I asked if they could quote me the cost to ship to the UK and yep, it's $12.75 for a single CD shipped to UK (it used to be $6.15). This was a standard jewel case CD, so I do think the Hypnos digipaks will come in at just under the 4-oz mark and that cost is around $9.50

I sent a parcel of 3CDs, 2 in standard jewel cases and one digipak, from the UK to the States, by airmail, the other day, it cost £6.76 = around $10.60, parcel weight came out at 0.325kg, so it is less to send 3 discs from the UK to the States than it is to send one disc from the States to the UK, pretty shocking, so while Royal Mail have steadily increased their prices year upon year, it is still not as bad as your increases, which seem to be extortionate to say the least. What you need to do is find a distibutor in the UK, then find some way of getting your discs to them cheaply, so they can then ship them back to your fans in the states, one disc is around £3.70 = around $5.80 to the States from here. Pretty ironic really!

I agree with those above: another nail in the coffin for CD's. And a huge ding for the world economy in general, not just CD's. The economic situation is just getting really oppressive at this point, we're paying more and more for less and less and the physical world is dissolving into a digital one. Pretty sad if you ask me. My rent has gone up $140 in the last year, due to recent tax laws I'm getting $60 less per month on my paychecks, bridge tolls, stamps, gas, UP UP UP UP UP>>>

There are no jobs, if you do get a job most likely you won't get health benefits, the schools are overcrowded, the government raises everything year and year and continues to cry "broke"....